This hand cost me a lot and I would like to know if I played it right. I had 10 A and landed a 10 on the flop. There was a raise to 6x the BB and I re-raised 3x the raise. Everyone called.

Flop: 9s 5d 10s Turn: 2s River: 8s

On the turn there was a spade and someone went all-in (about 2 x the pot). He could've had a flush but I kinda thought he was bluffing as if he had pocket spades, he wouldn't have just called my re-raise but re-raised it further?

So I called while everyone else folded. And the bugger got lucky hitting a spade on the river. He had Qd 7s. So, should I have given up the pot to an all-in that was twice the pot size, knowing that he was just betting to hit a river card? I felt bad giving in to someone that wanted to steal the pot with an oversized bet...and worse that it paid off for him.

With AT on the button, I'm going to make a standard preflop raise here (3BB+1BB for each limper) both for value and to try to eliminate some of the opps. AT, or any hand for that matter, plays much better against fewer opponents. With 5 limpers, I'll raise to 8BB or 16 chips.

I flop top pair, but there is a straight draw, flush draw and even a combo draw available. With bet sizes on the flop/turn/river, I do not want to look at them in terms of BB, but by how large of a % of the pot they are. I have one opp bet 3/4 pot, a call, then a min raise. Here is where I need to make my decision in the hand. I either need to raise or fold here and due to the large number of opps in the hand, I'm going to have to raise more and would need to make a bet between 3X the previous bet (72) and a pot-sized raise (88). Due to how many opps are in the pot, I'm opting for the larger of these numbers and will raise to 88.
I don't want to raise less than this, as it will give all the opps with draws, the correct odds to stay in to outdraw me. Min raises like this will keep opps in the pot (and they should since they are getting the correct odds) and I'll lose more hands this way due to getting outdrawn.

The turn completes the spade flush and an opp shoves just under 2X the pot. This play by them is exactly what I'd expect from a flush, as since a standard bet makes them pot-committed, they should be shoving here. With 4 opps, they would need to make a pot-sized value bet, which is well over 1/3 their stack, which is the point where they are pot-committed.
If there were only 1 opp in the pot, then I agree that this would look more like a bluff, as they would only need to bet 1/2 pot, which would not pot-commit them, but not with multiple opps in the hand.
Due to this, I'm folding the turn and if by chance the opp doesn't show a turned flush, then I WILL be making a note on them that they will shove as a semi-bluff, so that I can use this information against them in the future.

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Thanks for the analysis, John Guess I'm gonna have to start taking notes on how my opps play- which I'm sure will come in handy in the future.

Hey Raiser,

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Also, please attend an 'Bet Sizing' live training session. This should help too.

This hand cost me everything, most unfortunately. I had the top pair and was forced to go all-in by an opp who was betting to hit a straight card on the river. Sadly he did and I lost. Was my play alright and was the opp who won just lucky?

Thanks in advance.

On another note, I have attended the Bet Sizing session way back with ChewMe1 (before I knew it was a step in this promo). I don't know if my attendance can be confirmed though and wonder if I'd have to re-attend the session.

This hand cost me everything, most unfortunately. I had the top pair and was forced to go all-in by an opp who was betting to hit a straight card on the river. Sadly he did and I lost. Was my play alright and was the opp who won just lucky?

Thanks in advance

Hi missy,

The things to look at in your play here are the preflop decision to get involved, and the bet sizing. AJo is not really a good enough hand to play in this position. We have a player raising from under the gun, and we are in early position too under the gun+1. So unless we have reads on villain 1 that they are very loose aggressive, we have a hand that can easily be behind them already since they raised from this position, and we still have the whole field of players behind us who can wake up with a hand. AJo is problematic here as we can hit a J and lose a lot of chips to QQ-AA, or hit an ace and lose a lot of chips to AK/AQ, all of which we need to be concerned about from the raiser.

When V1 checks to us on the flop it's reasonable to think we have the best hand, but the minimum bet of .02c into a pot of .15c isn't going to convince our opponents of that, and it gives them a good price to try and improve their hands for cheap. I would size the bet between .08-.12c both for value and protection.

V4 raised the small bet figuring your hand was weaker than it was, as a semi-bluff. It's a good play, you both showed weakness with a check and small bet, if you fold immediately he wins uncontested with 9 high, and if someone doesn't fold he still has both a flush draw and gut shot straight draw he can improve to.

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